>We should have destroyed the ship after the NKs took it.
I don't see how our men could have destroyed the ship after it was in possession of the N. Koreans.
From the air or from under the sea. Either could've been accomplished in a few hours. We also should have hit Tehran 12 hours after the ragheads took our citizens hostage. A half day seems like a reasonable amount of time to me.
If the Pueblo was, indeed, on a mission to deliver slightly defective crypto equipment to the NKs then we should have waited until the ship was offloaded and THEN blown up the port facilities and the ship. If that was the mission only the crew chief would have known of it among those on the boat.